The Epic Crush of Genie Lo Quotes

“People can always say I don't look impressive enough, but they can't argue over how strong I am once I punch them in the face.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“What’s the matter?” my mother snapped. “You sick?” I pulled my body back inside and bumped my head against the window hard enough to make the glass rattle, but the pain was inconsequential right now. “No, I . . . I just needed some fresh air.” She squinted at me. “Are you pregnant?” “What!? No! Why would you even think that?” “Well then if you’re not sick and you’re not pregnant then ANSWER ME WHEN I CALL YOUR NAME!”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“I was about as spiritual as a Chicken McNugget.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“Quentin took a deep breath.

“My true name,” he said, “ . . . is SUN WUKONG.”

A cold wind passed through the open window, rustling my loose papers like tumbleweed.

“I have no idea who that is,” I said.

Quentin was still trying to cement his “look at me being serious” face. It took him a few seconds to realize I wasn’t flipping out over whoever he was.

“The Sun Wukong,” he said, scooping the air with his fingers. “Sun Wukong the Monkey King.”

“I said, I don’t know who that is.”

His jaw dropped. Thankfully his teeth were still normal-size.

“You’re Chinese and you don’t know me?” he sputtered. “That’s like an American child not knowing Batman!”

“You’re Chinese Batman?”

“No! I’m stronger than Batman, and more important, like—like. Tian na, how do you not know who I am!?”

I didn’t know why he expected me to recognize him. He couldn’t have been a big-time actor or singer from overseas. I never followed mainland pop culture, but a lot of the other people at school did; word would have gotten around if we had a celebrity in our midst.

Plus that was a weird stage name. Monkey King? Was that what passed for sexy among the kids these days?”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“Spiritual power isn’t just or merciful. It’s fair. That’s what makes it so dangerous.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“Another flash of light streamed through the windows and then faded. I didn’t feel the need to go outside and check that they were gone. Guanyin really did not screw around when it came to making an exit.

I turned to Quentin. “How much of a dick do you have to be to upset the Goddess of Compassion into leaving without saying goodbye?”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“Because it wasn’t enough to be accompanied by the beast who scared the crap out of every god in Heaven, Xuanzang was assigned a few more traveling companions. The gluttonous pig-man Zhu Baijie. Sha Wujing, the repentant sand demon. And the Dragon Prince of the West Sea, who took the form of a horse for Xuanzang to ride. The five adventurers, thusly gathered, set off on their—

“Holy ballsacks!” I yelped. I dropped the book like I’d been bitten.

“How far did you get?” Quentin said.

He was leaning against the end of the nearest shelf, as casually as if he’d been there the whole time, waiting for this moment.

I ignored that he’d snuck up on me again, just this once. There was a bigger issue at play.

In the book was an illustration of the group done up in bold lines and bright colors. There was Sun Wukong at the front, dressed in a beggar’s cassock, holding his Ruyi Jingu Bang in one hand and the reins of the Dragon Horse in the other. A scary-looking pig-faced man and a wide-eyed demon monk followed, carrying the luggage. And perched on top of the horse was . . . me.

The artist had tried to give Xuanzang delicate, beatific features and ended up with a rather girly face. By whatever coincidence, the drawing of Sun Wukong’s old master could have been a rough caricature of sixteen-year-old Eugenia Lo from Santa Firenza, California.

“That’s who you think I am?” I said to Quentin.

“That’s who I know you are,” he answered. “My dearest friend. My boon companion. You’ve reincarnated into such a different form, but I’d recognize you anywhere. Your spiritual energies are unmistakable.”

“Are you sure? If you’re from a long time ago, maybe your memory’s a little fuzzy.”

“The realms beyond Earth exist on a different time scale,” Quentin said. “Only one day among the gods passes for every human year. To me, you haven’t been gone long. Months, not centuries.”

“This is just . . . I don’t know.” I took a moment to assemble my words. “You can’t walk up to me and expect me to believe right away that I’m the reincarnation of some legendary monk from a folk tale.”

“Wait, what?” Quentin squinted at me in confusion.

“I said you can’t expect me to go, ‘okay, I’m Xuanzang,’ just because you tell me so.”

Quentin’s mouth opened slowly like the dawning of the sun. His face went from confusion to understanding to horror and then finally to laughter.

“mmmmphhhhghAHAHAHAHA!” he roared. He nearly toppled over, trying to hold his sides in. “HAHAHAHA!”

“What the hell is so funny?”

“You,” Quentin said through his giggles. “You’re not Xuanzang. Xuanzang was meek and mild. A friend to all living things. You think that sounds like you?”

It did not. But then again I wasn’t the one trying to make a case here.

“Xuanzang was delicate like a chrysanthemum.” Quentin was getting a kick out of this. “You are so tough you snapped the battleaxe of the Mighty Miracle God like a twig. Xuanzang cried over squashing a mosquito. You, on the other hand, have killed more demons than the Catholic Church.”

I was starting to get annoyed. “Okay, then who the hell am I supposed to be?” If he thought I was the pig, then this whole deal was off.

“You’re my weapon,” he said. “You’re the Ruyi Jingu Bang.”

I punched Quentin as hard as I could in the face.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“I was ready when Quentin approached me after school the following day.

“Genie,” he said. “Please. Let me expl—moomph!”

“Stay away,” I said, mashing the bulb of garlic into his face as hard as I could. I didn’t have any crosses or holy water at home. I had to work with what was available.

Quentin slowly picked the cloves out of my hand before popping them into his mouth.

“That’s white vampires,” he said, chewing and swallowing the raw garlic like a bite of fruit. “If I was a jiangshi you should have brought a mirror.”

I wrinkled my nose. “You’re going to stink now.”

“What, like a Chinese?” He pursed his lips and blew a kiss at me.

Instead of being pungent, his breath was sweet with plum blossoms and coconut. Like his body magically refused to be anything but intensely appealing to me, even on a molecular level.

I tried to swat away his scent before it made me drunk.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“This is bull crap!” I shouted. “I’m tired! I don’t have the energy for this!”

“Genie,” Quentin said. “Please stop telling the swarm of yaoguai how weak you are right now.”

“I don’t want to deal with you!” I hollered at the demons from afar. “Screw everything! Evil wins, are you happy?”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“The sheer amount of effort I was putting into these essays had to add up to something. It would be a violation of thermodynamics if it didn’t.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“I let the divine being leave first and gave him a few minutes to do whatever it was he needed to do to get back to Heaven. It seemed polite, though I’d only made that rule up in my head.

When I stepped out of the shack, Quentin was there by the roadside, waiting for me.

“Have a nice chat?”

I knew his peevish tone was his usual allergic reaction to Erlang Shen, but for some reason I didn’t field it well today.

“Yeah, we really connected on an emotional level,” I snapped. “I promised to turn into a stick for him.”

That was perhaps the weirdest, most hyper-targeted dig I’d ever leveled at someone, but boy did it work. Quentin looked like I’d broken him in half and left him on the curb for pickup. He was completely silent the entire trip back to civilization.

He didn’t call or text me that night either”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“You wigged out because he wanted to have an arranged marriage right there in class? I thought FOBs were into that kind of thing.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“Quentin and I crawled outside the building and flopped onto the grass. I was bleeding from a gash across my forehead that he promised would seal itself and disappear within minutes, as long as I didn’t die first. With the way I felt, we’d have to wait and see.

Quentin grabbed his own fingers and pulled, relocating his joints. The popping noise made me want to vomit.

“Dear god,” I croaked. “How did . . . why was that . . . so hard?”

“He was an identical copy of me,” Quentin said. He spat a bloody tooth out to the side. “What were you expecting, a pushover?”

I watched his blood sink into the ground and sprout a little daisy with perfect white petals. Whatever. I was beyond surprise when it came to Quentin at this point.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“I squeezed my eyes shut so I wouldn’t have to look at my arm trailing away like the streamer on a bike handle.

“I can’t be stuck like this!” I wailed. Visions of having to gnaw it off like a jackal in a trap flooded my brain.

Quentin knelt before me and put his hands on my trembling shoulders.

“You’re not going to be stuck,” he said, his voice low and reassuring in my ears. “You are the most powerful thing on Earth short of a god. You can do absolutely anything. So believe me when I say you can certainly change your arm back to normal.”

He held me firmly, the way you’d brace someone trying to pop a dislocated joint back into place. “Just relax and breathe,” he said. “It’ll happen as you will it.”

I took his advice and focused on calming down. Focused on nothing. Focused on him.

I couldn’t really feel my arm retracting. And I certainly didn’t want to look at it happening. I just . . . remembered how I was supposed to be. I kept quiet, kept at it for what must have been a good ten minutes, until I could feel both of my hands firmly on Quentin’s broad back.

“There you go,” he said.

I opened my eyes. My arm was normal again. I was aware that we were sort of hugging.

I buried my face in his chest and blew my nose on his shirt. “I’m a human being,” I muttered.

“I never said you weren’t.”

I raised my head. Quentin looked at me with a smile that was free of any smugness. He didn’t even mind my snot on his lapel.

“Reincarnation as a human is practically the highest goal any spirit can achieve,” he said. “It’s considered the next best thing to enlightenment. If anything, I’m proud of you for what you’ve accomplished.”

I’m not sure why, but the rage that had been so palpable before seemed to float away at his words. Like I could have been angry with him forever had he said anything different.

I was mildly relieved. It was a hell of a one-eighty on my part, but right now I didn’t think I wanted to hate Quentin until the end of time.

“Genie Lo, you are unquestionably, undeniably human,” he said. “You just . . . have a whole bunch of other stuff going on as well.”

“Tell me about it.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“What he really needed was a weapon. A big, threatening, FU kind of weapon that would show everyone the Monkey King meant business.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“This was our version of fighting. We were incapable of getting truly angry with each other, so instead we tore our hearts out and handed them over on silver platters.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“The Monkey King managed to outsmart or defeat most of these adversaries, but what came afterward was rather galling. If the demon at hand wasn’t killed and sent back to Hell immediately, it was often revealed to be an animal spirit from Heaven who had gained magic powers and used them to terrorize people on Earth. After Sun Wukong’s victory, a Chinese god would show up and be like, “Sorry, bruh, that ogre was actually my goldfish. I’ll take him back now.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“I glanced at Quentin, and then stared. He blazed like a golden bonfire. Energy poured off him in licking waves, an act of inefficient combustion that leaked so much power into the air I could hear the atmosphere whine and sizzle. There was a scorching heat at his core, and I was immune to it. Around his shoulders was the faintest palimpsest overlay of another form. Skin as hard as diamonds. Fur as soft as velvet. A face of becalmed savagery. He was magnificent. Godlike. A Buddha victorious in battle.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“I, as an immortal, with infinite eternities to enjoy, advise you, a pathetic insect whose life span is but a candle flicker, to at least have some fun before you die.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“The people we care about make the grind worthwhile. Even if the two never meet.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“Santa Firenza was a blacktopped hellscape of bubble tea shops and strip-mall nail salons, where feral children worshipped professional video-game streamers. The major cultural contribution of this part of the country was recording yourself dancing alongside your car while it rolled forward with no one driving it.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“For someone who gives me such a hard time about my weight, you'd think she wouldn't cook so goddamn much.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo

“My true name,” he said, “ . . . is SUN WUKONG.” A cold wind passed through the open window, rustling my loose papers like tumbleweed. “I have no idea who that is,” I said.”
― F.C. Yee, The Epic Crush of Genie Lo